Texas Democrats are demanding an apology over state Representative Betty Brown’s comments during Texas House testimony on voter identification. She was quoted as saying voters of Asian-descent should adopt names that are “easier for Americans to deal with.” Ramey Ko, a representative of the Organization of Chinese Americans, testified at the committee meeting that many Asian people in the United States face voting challenges because their legal names and Americanized names don’t always match.
Brown suggested that Asian-Americans should find a way to make their names more accessible.
“Rather than everyone here having to learn Chinese — I understand it’s a rather difficult language — do you think that it would behoove you and your citizens to adopt a name that we could deal with more readily here?” Brown said. She later told Ko: “Can’t you see that this is something that would make it a lot easier for you and the people who are poll workers if you could adopt a name just for identification purposes that’s easier for Americans to deal with?”
What’s incredible about this exchange is that Representative Brown doesn’t find her remarks as racially insensitive. As an immigrant to the U.S. and one that had a particularly difficult name to pronounce, I was subject to a lot of ridicule as a child. Other children would mis-pronounce my Chinese name as “dum-dum”. This got so bad that my parents finally gave me an American name. But like many of the Asians that Ko talked about, my American name didn’t match my legal Chinese name for much of my life. When I first had the right to vote at the age of 18, I would have encountered the same issues discussed by Ko if I was required to produce identification. I clung to my Americanized name of Timothy for much of my young life, but when I went to college, I contemplated going back to my Chinese name. I even wrote some pieces under my Chinese name, but in the end for convenience I stuck with my American name.
The subject of Asian names in American society is no stranger to 8Asians. Just recently, guest writer Chunsoon, wrote a hotly debated piece on changing her adoptive name from her legal American one to a Korean name. Representative Brown needs to get a clue. For Asians self-identity has a lot to do with what we call ourselves, but little to do with what our names are legally.
What next?
Other posts you may be interested in:
- Asian, Westerners Accents & Language Barriers
- Random Poll: Do you pronounce your last name the way it’s spelled or the way it’s supposed to sound?
- Asian Americans voters face discrimination
- The New Chinese Exclusion Act? Whatever.
- Are Illegal Extramarital Affairs in South Korea Outdated and Ready for Change?
Recent Comments
- KFC vs. KGC: WTF???
- alienation: This is a great thread! I grew up eating Kentucky Fried Chicken. My family would make an effort to get it in East L.A., over by the King Cole Pizza. It was way better than the Kentucky Fried over in MPK and up in SG. I...
- Proof that Russell of Disney/Pixar’s Up is Asian: The Color Scripts
- Daul Kim: One Sassy ‘n Smart Bitch
- Najib: I wonder what is going on with this girl. She has been fooled into this simulacrum, and what she thought was real is not real at all.
- Mending Broken Glass: Khmer Rouge History Now to be Taught in Cambodia
- kbok: it may seem shocking to other people that kids don’t believe their elders when hearing about khmer rouge atrocities, but if your mother told you that soldiers shot at her, pushing her off a mountain and into landmine paths...
- Chinese Adoptees: Stolen or Abandoned?
- Dan: CSLI, I think my previous comment stated that I “hope” not “should”. It was not meant to belittle anyone and yes I can imagine just like most people, adopted or not. Though the effect will not be the same as...
- Obama Bows to Emperor Akihito
- JC: @ Eric: Not only that, he’s half brother lives in China and is married to a Chinese woman. There’s a lot of Asian in his family
- Yahoo! Games Writer Freaks Out Over Nintendo DS Dating Simulations
- JC: This guy knows next to nothing about Otaku culture and dare to write about Japanese games. It’s just another ignorant white person making self-righteous judgment calls against another part of Asian culture. He’s just...
Recent Events
- [Nov 3] NORTHERN CA: Intro to Movietelling (Neo-Benshi) with Dennis Somera
- [Nov 14] SOUTHERN CA: Grace Kim & the Spiders From Mars
- [Nov 20] NORTHERN CA: CATS 9th Annual Asian Comedy Night starring 18 Mighty Mountain Warriors
- [Nov 21] SOUTHERN CA: BANANA: Where Infamous Asian-American Bloggers Unite to Chop It Up
- [Nov 22] TORONTO: S.M. Global Audition
15 Comments to “Betty Brown: “Really, Just Change Your Name””
John wrote:
Join the “Down with Betty Brown” Facebook group here:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=84118977753
Posted on 09-Apr-09 at 2:52 pm | Permalink
Charles wrote:
Hmmm, actually Americanized names would cause *more* problems with Chinese, Korean and Vietnamese where there are a relatively small number of surnames. The only alternative would be more and more unusual given names.
I didn’t notice Ms. Brown asking Polish people to change their surnames.
Posted on 09-Apr-09 at 3:08 pm | Permalink
Linda wrote:
Clearly this woman is living in the 18th century. And good point Charles about the Polish names!
Posted on 09-Apr-09 at 5:46 pm | Permalink
daniel wrote:
“They want this to just be about race,” Berry said.”
well if it’s not about race, then what is it about, smartypants?
Posted on 09-Apr-09 at 7:10 pm | Permalink
Ernie wrote:
Okay, so who here quietly thought to themselves, “What are you talking about? Chinese names are totally easy to pronounce. Now the Thai names are fucking difficult”?
No one? Just me? Okay…
Posted on 09-Apr-09 at 8:45 pm | Permalink
Danny wrote:
Well those x’s and z’s kinda throw me off. Xiang.. is that Shee-ang or Zee ang.. . same reason I can’t handle those strange aztecan words
Posted on 09-Apr-09 at 11:01 pm | Permalink
Confuse-us wrote:
The solution is to only use poll workers who speak Chinese fluently.
Posted on 10-Apr-09 at 3:14 am | Permalink
Catherine wrote:
At first I thought she was ignorant. Then I saw her photo and realized that eye shadow seepage into her brain has wrought it’s damage. Poor, deranged woman.
Posted on 10-Apr-09 at 5:39 am | Permalink
flinc wrote:
Does Mike Krzyzewski get this kind of static?
Posted on 10-Apr-09 at 8:30 am | Permalink
John wrote:
@FLINC – Krzyzewski – yeah, totally! How that comes across being pronounced as “Shə-zhef-skee” is beyond me!
Posted on 10-Apr-09 at 9:23 am | Permalink
V wrote:
haha. that’s true about polish names. My 6th grade teacher had us take attendance by spelling his name. We were all assigned letters, S z c z e c h o w s k i (pronounced Mr. Sha-hus-ky) when everybody was there we would spell his name completely twice. He said when he was in the army, he got out of a lot of stuff because the drill sergeant didn’t know how to pronounce his name.
Posted on 10-Apr-09 at 9:38 am | Permalink
cynematic wrote:
The racist insistence on APAs changing their names is bullshit, but the Voter ID bill Betty Brown is trying to pass in TX (and the Photo ID bill that’ll be on the next ballot initiative in CA) are far WORSE. Asking for voter ID is a time-honored GOP method of voter suppression. Think about it–a simple clerical error or a person predisposed to “misread” your ID could cause you to lose your right to vote.
More here: http://momocrats.typepad.com/momocrats/2009/04/asian-names-should-be-changed-potential-for-voter-suppression-by-any-other-name.html
Posted on 10-Apr-09 at 12:46 pm | Permalink
Allen wrote:
Sometimes I wonder about voter suppression methods whether they’re well-intentioned but ignorant or racist and mean-spirited. In Betty Brown’s case, it seems more the former than the latter.
Posted on 11-Apr-09 at 12:33 am | Permalink
Kai Carver wrote:
Wow, way to misquote her by cutting the context. In the video, in the sentence immediately following she says “I’m not talking about changing your name, I’m talking about the transliteration or whatever you refer to that you could use with us.”
She sounds very ignorant, unlike the guy she’s talking to, Ramey Ko, who’s very well-spoken and informative (I wish the video had more of his testimony). But I think calling Betty Brown racist for this is ridiculous and a cheap shot. It looks to me like she’s making an honest attempt to try to educate herself on what’s a tricky topic. It sounds like she thinks consistent transliteration would be a good way to solve the problem, but obviously it’s more complicated, as Ko then explains.
He’s the one who brings up names as an issue for voter registration. And he’s the one who explains there’s a problem, not just because of varied transliterations, but because naturalized citizens often come to the States with one name and later use an anglicized name, so a discrepancy develops between different forms of ID.
So, far from telling Asians to change their names, you could argue Brown is saying “Why don’t you just keep your Chinese name and stop changing it?” Ko then explains why it’s not that simple.
Posted on 13-Apr-09 at 10:16 am | Permalink
8Asians.com » Popular Posts in the Past 15 Days wrote:
[...] Betty Brown: “Really, Just Change Your Name” – “… calling Betty Brown racist for this is ridiculous and a cheap shot. It looks to me like she’s making an honest attempt to try to educate herself on what’s a tricky topic.” – Kai, from the comments [...]
Posted on 02-May-09 at 6:42 am | Permalink
Post a Comment